LePage proposes Tree Growth tightening that would have barred Poliquin

Good morning from Augusta, where Gov. Paul LePage has submitted yet another late bill to the Legislature, this time in a bid to increase the amount of wood cut in southern Maine.

The timing could sink the bill, as it’s three weeks from the end of the 2016 legislative session, leaving lawmakers little time to consider it.

But the bill is interesting because it would limit access to Maine’s Tree Growth program, the law giving property tax breaks to landowners who manage forests for commercial timber harvesting. It wouldn’t allow into the program parcels that are within 10 miles of the ocean or cover less than 25 acres.

Coastal property is a main weakness of the law, with a 2009 state report that cited a wide concern that coastal landowners are in the program to simply “avoid paying their fair share of local property taxes” and that many local tax assessors didn’t know that they could reject applications.

He once had 10 acres of the property in the program, even though a deed restriction largely prohibits timber harvesting. The property was cited in the state report as an example of “problematic enrollment.”

The Maine House of Representatives approved a bill Wednesday that would impose legislative review on the LePage administration’s proposed rule changes to services for people with autism or other intellectual disabilities.

It came after outcry from families after the administration proposed a test used by 22 other states to determine a person’s capabilities and the amount of paid support they need.

The bill was supported 83-64 in a mostly party-line vote, with Democrats supporting it. It now goes to the Republican-controlled Senate. — Michael Shepherd

Quick hits

Things got nasty on Wednesday after House Republicans overrode a LePage veto of a unanimously passed bill that aimed to speed up health assessments of children entering state custody. LePage called it “micromanagement” of the executive branch” and Sen. Geoff Gratwick, D-Bangor, the bill’s sponsor, criticized House Republicans for “blind, unthinking partisan loyalty.”

At the town hall, LePage said he doesn’t read newspaper, but “I sell a lot of them.” But that irony wasn’t lost on Scott Monroe, my old boss and the managing editor at the Kennebec Journal and the Morning Sentinel.

“If he helps sell so many newspapers, why the low demand?” he tweeted.

About Michael Shepherd

Michael Shepherd joined the Bangor Daily News in 2015 after covering state, federal and local issues for the Kennebec Journal for three years. He's a Hallowell native who now lives in Gardiner. He graduated from the University of Maine in 2012 and is a graduate student at the University of Southern Maine's Muskie School of Public Service.
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